Vocational Connections | February 2024

The 2024 NetVUE Conference is just around the corner, and we are looking forward to hosting over (how many institution teams?) in Atlanta this March 21-23! The three plenary speakers will provide perspectives on the overall conference theme, “Vocations for the Life of the World,” exploring various dimensions of the intersection of self and other: […]

Published on January 10, 2024, NetVUE’s new Scholarly Resources volume is hot off the press. While the previous three volumes engaged questions at the intersection of vocation and higher education, Called Beyond Our Selves explores vocation within the context of the common good and underscores how the individual life and the communal life are bound […]

Consider gathering a group of faculty members and/or staff on your campus to read a collection of articles on vocation and calling during the spring semester. NetVUE will supply free copies of the Summer 2023 issue of Christian Scholars Review, which includes six excellent articles on vocation and several useful book reviews. The six authors […]

The first NetVUE regional gathering of the 2024–2025 cycle will take place May 16–18, 2024, in Grand Rapids, Michigan. It is being co-hosted by three NetVUE institutions: Aquinas College, Calvin University, and Cornerstone University. The topic, Vocation, Higher Education, and the City, is designed to prompt an exploration of the ways that colleges and universities […]

NetVUE’s podcast Callings has dropped three exciting episodes since our last newsletter, featuring three voices who have made incredible contributions to the intersection of vocational reflection and academia: Parker Palmer, Katharine Hayhoe, and Shirley Hoogstra.  Shadow and Light: Parker Palmer Well before the founding of NetVUE (and even before the Lilly Endowment’s vocation programming began […]

Check out the NetVUE blog Vocation Matters for a new cohort of bloggers this spring semester. That cohort includes a team of faculty members at Nebraska Wesleyan University (Lincoln, NE) who will contribute a series on “Major Decisions, Major Discoveries: Exploring Vocation in the Undergraduate Years,” which focuses on how to help students develop meaning […]

Join us for a conversation about promoting vocational exploration beyond the traditional campus. Our panelists (pictured here, clockwise from top left) will be Heather Brady of Grand View University, who will discuss community engagement with a focus on social justice; Jason Mahn of Augustana University (IL), who will help us think about education for vocation […]

Many colleges and universities use retreats to facilitate vocational exploration among students. The opportunity to leave campus, remove oneself from distractions, and embark on meaningful exploration is valuable. But while some retreats are designed to cut through the harsh realities of our world in order to focus on the interior, this is a story about […]

By Samantha D. Brown, assistant professor of psychology at Coe College In May 2024, my colleague Barb Tupper, associate vice president for advancement, and I will be hosting a three-day seminar about teaching vocation for faculty members and staff at Coe College. The two of us are leaders within Coe’s C3 initiative, which fosters connections […]

Congratulations to long-time NetVUE leader Younus Mirza, who recently received a grant sponsored by the Henry Luce Foundation and the American Academy of Religion (AAR) focusing on advancing public scholarship on religion. The program supports scholars of religion who are working to engage publics in innovative ways, through projects designed for presentation in public spaces […]

Reviewed by Rachael Baker, NetVUE Director of Professional Development The Good Enough Job explores the relationships that people (in North America) have with their paid work. The author, Simone Stolzoff, invites us to consider stories in which interviewed workers are grappling with the reality that the promises for fulfillment in their paid careers have not […]

By John Barton, co-host of the NetVUE podcast, Callings Vocational discernment does not begin with a blank canvas. The goals and choices we make, and the preparations we pursue, emerge within the circumstances of life. But when we talk about vocational discernment in the context of higher education, we still tend to think in terms […]